Apex court restrains SIT in Ishrat Jahan case

New Delhi: The Supreme Court Tuesday restrained the Special Investigation Team (SIT) from continuing its probe into the 2004 Ishrat Jahan staged shooting case.

The apex court bench of Justice B. Sudarshan Reddy and Justice S.S. Nijjar issued the restraining order after senior counsel Ranjit Kumar told the court that the SIT had been reduced to just one officer.

The apex court direction restraining SIT from carrying out further probe was on a petition by one of the officers under investigation Girish Laxman Singhal. The restrain order will remain in force till May 11 when the matter will come up for hearing before the court.

Mumbai college student Ishrat Jahan, Pranesh Pillai, Amjad Ali Rana and Zeeshan Johar were killed in a staged shootout on the outskirts of Ahmedabad in June 2004 by the city crime branch officials. The police had termed them as LeT operatives on a mission to kill Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.